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Heavy for caliber, Nosler Partition, 200gr ,30cal

That’s my decision for the 3006 NP 200….

Trying to decide what to use in my .308 Norma.

I have killed several truckloads of elk along with deer and antelope using these 200 Partitions loaded WARM in my 30-06. About the perfect elk bullet IMO. Completely superior performance over the 180 Partitions I have used in my 30-06. The handful of recovered bullets were collected after raking shots on game and deep penetration.

So, now that you have/had the cow tag, did you kill one with your last possible way?

Got any pictures?

While they are not de rigueur, they still work, and often far better than the current crop of alphabet bullets. Farthest BG animal I ever took was 548 yards with a 180 Partition. Since I'll never shoot beyond that at game, and won't take windy shots either, slippery bullets mean little to me.

Dave, don't sleep on the 108 ELDM out of the 6 creed, my friend....

Or the 105 hybrid. IIRC a few years back, Pat and his pals filled a truck bed with a bunch of elk all killed with a 6 creed/105 hybrid combo...

Brad,

I tend to agree--and partly because like you I have frequently hunted elk in grizzly country. In fact killed my first maybe 25 miles from where a high-school classmate killed a big boar on his family's ranch, at age 12. This was back when Yellowstone Park bears were dispersing after the "feeding dumps" were closed down. He shot it between the eyes with a .25-35, which of course did the job.

Have hunted elk mostly in Montana--and mostly in grizzly country, which these days includes the mountain ranges on either side of our valley. But have also hunted elk in northern British Columbia, where I took both a 6x6 bull and a good-sized bull moose. Had a big grizzly try to come in while my guide and I were taking the moose apart--and we finished the job by taking turns, the other guy standing guard with a rifle. When we rode out past the spot a couple days later, a BIG boar was sitting 100 yards off the trail, next to what remained of the moose--much of which was apparently in the bear's distended belly. He was so stuffed he just watched us ride by....

Killed the elk very late in the evening in an area where one of the other guides had to kill a charging grizzly a week or so before, but luckily did not encounter one on the hour-long ride in the dark back to camp.

Would rather not hunt elk in griz country with anything less than something like a .30-06 with deep-penetrating bullets--whether the 200 Partition, or my latest favorite in the '06, the 175 Barnes LRX.

The other factor when I started hunting was most elk in that area were found in thick timber during rifle season, partly because there weren't nearly as many elk back then, and most had learned to head for dark timber when hunter activity (including tent camps being set up) started to accelerate prior to opening day. Which is why my first several elk were killed within 100 yards--using the .30-06 and 200 Partitions, the first few with the old lathe-turned "semi-spitzer." Never recovered one--and the elk died quickly.

Since then have not only hunted elk in several other parts of Montana but British Columbia, Colorado, Idaho and New Mexico. Despite a lot of open high country in BC's Prophet-Muskwa country, most elk were found lower down in thicker cover--partly due to grizzlies. Saw 10 of 'em during that a 10-day hunt, as close as 50 yards. And even in griz-free New Mexico many elk were in thicker stuff--killed a big bull at 100 yards in Gambel oak so thick I could only see the top half the of the bull's body. In Colorado the elk hung out more in the open, but it was windy and cold the morning I killed one at medium-long range.

But around here many elk now hang out on valley ranches, rather than up in the mountains. Eileen has killed her last two with one shot using much smaller rounds, the first with the .257 Roberts--but used the 100-grain TTSX, a medium-sized cow. The range was a lasered 123 yards at close to last light, and it worked fine--but the cow was angling away, and it was nice to know the bullet would penetrate sufficiently.

I took a big cow a couple weeks ago during the "shoulder season" in central Montana, using my 6.5 PRC with a 127-grain Barnes LRX. She went right down with minimal meat damage, which these days is more important to me than antlers. While that isn't officially grizzly country, two have been encountered within 100 miles or so of there in the past year or two. These days you never know!

John

Mule Deer, thanks for the insight on the LRX. I've started shooting the 175 LRX in my 30.06 as well for the same reasons you mentioned, hunting in grizzly country. Do you think the Barnes TTSX 165/168 would suffice in similar circumstances wrt dealing with big bears or is the quick expansion of the LRX design and the 15-20 gr. wt. increase give it enough edge to negate the TTSX bullets?

Tag

Hi John, yes those pesky grizzlies. I generally put them out of mind. Last one I ran into was in 2020. It was a smart bear, and took off at a full run when I yelled at it. Within reason I don't let it affect what I carry, but a 308 with 4 or 5 down is probably my favorite. I still think standard bullets that fragment w/ copper and lead kill game faster than mono's, but those mono's are certainly going to out-penetrate cup bullets of similar weight. Partitions are still my favorite bullet.

One of the carpenters that worked for me had to kill a big boar up in the Bob about ten years back. He was hunting the early rifle season, and surprised the bear sleeping. It charged, and his first shot hit it in the chest. It kept coming. His second shot went in its eye, and the bullet traveled the inside circumference of the skull and was found on the inside of the skull near the opposite eye (7em-em and 175gr Corelokt's). The bear died a few feet from him.

An outfitter acquaintance told me about getting attacked by a sow with cubs he'd surprised. She got him in a "bear hug" from behind and wouldn't let go. He finally was able to swing the butt of his rifle around and doinked here solidly in the nose, whereupon the bear ran off. He said with a grin, "don't anyone ever tell you a 30-06 isn't enough for grizzlies!"

When I was brown bear hunting on Upper Togiak Lake a 7 1/2 brown bear (smallish) started sniffing at my guide while he was doing his bizzness of course in the pouring rain. Next thing I knew he was running (not charging) at me. I was sitting on the raft glassing the far shore with my rifle 4 feet away with my scope covers on. I stood up and yelled at him and told him to get his furry ass back in the woods. He did. My guide just looked at me and shook his head and said "This is going to be a long hunt" lol

The LRXs don't expand any faster than TTSXs, and in fact its pretty much a myth that any expanding big game bullets expand "faster." Instead just about any, except Berger Hunting VLDs and some other similar "target-type" bullets, where expansion is delayed slightly. All other expanding bullets open up completely within their length, which is rarely over 1.5".

Instead the LRXs are designed to expand at lower impact velocities than TTSXs--such as at longer ranges. So far I have not idea how much weight they retain on game, since I haven't recovered any--and the first 175 LRX I took any game with penetrated a angling-away mule deer at 325 yards, penetrating around three feet before exiting. In other words, they seem to penetrate like TTSXs.

N.W. corner outside of Yellowstone park 10 miles from camp had a mama grizzly come out 60 feet from me with 2 second year cubs she looked at me than ran away ,my mule was not happy either guide was behind me laughing and said that was a good bear ,i then asked him what if the that bear came after us guide said that would be a dead bear. we were using 338 Win.mags 225 Nosler Partitions.

I have hunted around grizzlies (and brown bears) long enough to "generally put them out of my mind," but not entirely. My first "guided" elk hunt was actually a drop-camp in the Scapegoat Wilderness, the southern-most of the wilderness areas making up the Bob Marshall Complex. Well-known outfitter Smoke Elser dropped off a couple friends and me at an already set-up wall tend camp right on the border of the Scapegoat. The backcountry rifle season opened the next day, September 15th.

Turned out elk were pretty scarce, as they often are in high-elevation wilderness, because as the late Jack Atcheson Sr. often pointed out, a lot of wilderness is "goat rocks," where there isn't much elk feed. All I saw while hiking dozens of miles during the week was a cow and calf, though did hear a couple of very distant bugles. But on the main foot/horse trail in the valley north of our camp came across both fresh wolverine tracks, and the tracks of a mature grizzly--which were often on top of the wolverine tracks.

Have been charged twice by brown bears, both on Kodiak Island, within a half-hour. Was on a fishing trip in the early 1990s out of then-new Zachar Bay Lodge, and a group of us were hiking the shoreline of the bay on the way to catch salmon and Dolly Vardens in the Zachar River. Some of the group were workers for Nestle, who'd been given the trip as a "bonus," and eight of us (including Eileen) were in a line behind a guide, who carried a pump shotgun with slugs. (He was a very experienced brown bear guide, along with other game and fishing).

The shoreline consisted of an average of 50 yards of sand, with steep, brushy ridges coming down to the sand every 100 yards or so. We soon came around a ridge-bend, and saw a couple of brown bear cubs 50-75 yards away on the sand at the base of a ridge. Mama was a few yards above them, and when she saw us ran down the ridge and started huffing and puffing, bouncing up and down on her front paws.

When the lead Nestle guy saw this, he ran in front of the guide with the shotgun, to get videos of the bears. Mama charged --and the guide couldn't shoot around the Nestle nitwit. Luckily, it was a bluff charge, and mama bear rounded up the cubs and headed back up the hillside. The guide then REALLY reamed out the Nestle guy.

A couple ridges later just about exactly the same thing happened--two cubs on the beach, and mama bear heading downhill toward them and us. Except the Nestle guy did not run out in front of the group.

According to much bear lore this wasn't supposed to happen, since brown/grizzly bears are supposed to be more cautious around larger groups of people. But I have yet to be able to assume what's supposed to happen when surprising a grizzly at close range. Did it another time when hunting black bears in spring at the northern end of the Bob Marshall, when I came slowly around a bend in a trail to a small clearing--and a big boar grizzly was feeding at the opposite side of the clearing, around 30 feet away. We stared at each other for a few seconds, and then he turned away and wandered off through the surrounding trees and brush. But he didn't have to....

JB, isn’t the .308 168 gr TTSX supposed to expand down to 1500 fps? Will the 175 LRX do the same?

Barnes generally suggests 2000 fps for TTSX bullets and 1600 for LRX bullets.

That’s a huge difference. I’d say that’s a minimum of 200 extra yards if bit closer to 300 in additional hunting range

Barnes bullets are always best when ran light for caliber. Think 180 in a 300 rum 165 in a WM and 150, 06 and down.

I’ll have to disagree on the 150 in 06. In 308 yes.

But 168 in 06 for me it’s a good balance and retains velocity longer.

I dug this out of the internet, from 2017 on long range hunting forum:



Hello Ty,

I have read that the original TSX was designed for a minimum impact velocity of 1800 FPS, and that the TTSX was designed for a minimum impact velocity of 2000 FPS, and that this was true pretty much across the board for all calibers. Is that true? If so, what is the advantage of the plastic tip increasing the BC for a TTSX vs a TSX of the same weight since the TTSX takes more velocity to expand, and the max range for reliable expansion will likely be about the same?

Specifically, I'm wondering about the .308 cal, 168 grain TSX and TTSX that I will be loading for deer and possibly elk where my shots might range out to 400-500 yards. Are there different min impact velocities for these bullets?

I'll be loading them in a 30-06. Do you have any load data using Superformance for these bullets?

Thanks!"

he responded...

"Hi Anthony,

Originally that was indeed the case with rare exception. However as we optimize each bullet, many have changed. Originally we found that the TTSX required slightly higher impact velocity in our water tank test, compared to equal velocities in ordinance gelatin or tissue – so we simply made the TTSX test 200fps higher to offset the difference in real tissue.

The .308 cal 168gr TSX and TTSX are both optimized for the 308 Win and 30-06 ammunition by reducing the minimum impact velocity to 1500fps. Compared to the 165gr TSX and TTSX at 1800fps – optimized for the 300 WSM and 300 Win Mag. See the data attached. We didn't test that particular combination – it may be quite compressed. You should be able to extrapolate a load using the 175gr LRX and 180gr TTSX.

Thanks, Ty"